Has anyone read this before?

I've decided it's stupid to worry about hardware, because I can't affect anything anyway and all it does is make me wonder, so whatever happens, happens. But I did come across this from a friend and I think it's interesting to sort of think about it. I'm not looking for speculation, seems like everyone is interested in finding other opinions in hopes of reinforcing their own, it reminds me of people who listen to other people's political views instead of quietly forming thier own from personal experience and preferences. Anyway, if you get a minute check out this article.

[quote]From the "article":
<strong>I was surfing the net and came across this from a Apple News site
Enjoy:

The latest from the source who has brought us several previous anonymous
reports on the G5 has sent in quite a whopper with details on numerous
Apple fronts. Some of the details, particularly where they involve SGI,
have been disputed by other sources, so as with all rumors, trust no
one:

At Apple, we are quite pleased with the way the G5 has progressed. As of
noon, we received version 0.7 of the G5. Altivec performance is now at
par with equivalent clock speed 7460's. We spent a late night Friday
night fitting prototypes with the new revision, and spent the day
saturday doing various tests.

Yields are now just at the commercially acceptable level. Good news is
that clock speeds have been improved to the point where 1.6 Ghz chips
will be in adequate quantities. Another clock speed record was also set:
1 chip tested at 2.8 Ghz, 2 tested at 2.6 Ghz, 13 tested at 2.4 Ghz, 13
tested at 2.2Ghz, and 54 tested at 2Ghz. This shows that the G5 has
tremendous potential at reaching high frequencies, being this early in
its life. This is in sharp contrast to Intel's Itanium, which when I
spoke to an Intel engineer at the semiconductor forum, they still are
not getting sufficient yields above 800Mhz, an yields on current
processors are very, very poor, hence the steep price of the Itanium.
Mckinley is not faring too well either, progress has not been very good
on increasing its clock speed for release sometime next year. The aim is
to speed bump the G5 to between 2Ghz and 2.4 Ghz for Macworld New York.
Above 1.6 Ghz, the G5 will be produced in 400Mhz increments.

Apple could theoretically sign off now, but Jon Rubinstein wants to go
through one more revision. All the critical bugs have now been worked
out, but there are a couple of minor optimizations that will go into
revision 0.8, which is due within two weeks. Likely, these slight
optimizations will result in version 0.8 being declared 1.0, and mass
production will go on throughout December to get a critical volume of
chips for a Mid-December production run of Power Mac G5's.

Anyone considering buying a G5 better be forwarned: the chip price may
mean that Apple may not be able to offer G5 Power Macs for the same
price as current G4 models. There has been talk between Steve Jobs, Jon
Rubinstein, and Phil Schiller about possibly offering 7460 G4's at the
low end in the professional models in two configurations, which would
also appease Motorola. Apple would have five models of pro desktops
until G5 prices fall low enough to warrant having them in the low-end
pro models. There is talk of two 7460 G4 models, and 3 G5 models. Talk
is that the low end G5 model will sell for slightly more than the
current 867Mhz G4. The G5 towers will also sport the quicksilver
enclosure initially, which will be changed at Macworld New York. People
should understand that even though the G5 is considerably more expensive
than the G4, it is a steal considering that we are getting at least 60%
overall instructions per cycle than Intel's Itanium, and that it is a
64-bit processor. The 32 bit version of the G5 will be solely targeted
towards embedded applications, as 32-bit addressing is no longer
adequate for desktop applications.

The long awaited LCD iMac will also make its debut at Macworld San
Francisco. It will be available at up to 1Ghz, 900Mhz being the scenario
should yields of IBM's next generation G3's not be sufficient enough at
1Ghz.

Steve Jobs has very ambitious plans for Apple's processor strategy. He
recently said "We've been stuck with the G4 for over two years, that's
too long". His intentions are that the G5 have a life of 18 months in
the Pro models. He wants the G6 to hit initial silicon between next
December, and February 2003, and release it in mid-2003. Initially, the
G6 will be fabbed with a 0.1 micron process moving to .07(.065) micron.
It will be built upon the HIP 8.0 process, which is still not quite
finalized. It will feature Altivec II, which promises to at least double
performance of the current Altivec. Early estimates are that it will
contain over 100 million gates. The G6 will be introduced at between 4.5
and 5Ghz and scale up to 10 Ghz.

This week Apple has committed itself to going beyond the G6 to build a
G7, and maybe beyond. Apple is looking at Motorola's recently announced
Gallium Arsenide technology to give this chip insanely high clock
speeds. Talk is the G7 could go as high as 20 Ghz. The G7 would debut in
early to mid 2005. This renewed hope with the PowerPc architecture is in
light of the fact that Cisco Systems has committed to being a
significant customer of G5's for their high-end routers, and Silicon
Graphics being in the last stages of abandoning development on its
R16000 and R18000 processors as a cost-cutting measure. It looks very
likely it will sign a commitment with Apple, IBM and Motorola within a
month. It has prototype G5 chips in a prototype workstation of theirs,
and is hard at work developing Irix 7.0 for the G5.

In terms of future G5 development, work is well underway on the 8510,
which is a low-power SOI LoK dielectric version of the G5. It is due out
in late Q4 2002, and it will be an IBM product fabbed with its 0.1
micron process. Work is also progressing on the 8550, which is due out
Q1 2003. It will be a 0.1 micron chip built upon SOI LO-K dielectric. It
is a candidate to receive Altivec II if it is completed in time.

Relationships between Apple and Motorola as of late could very well be
described as Jeckyll and Hyde. Just three weeks ago, Steve Jobs said "I
am going to sue the ass of those guys at Motorola. At the last minute,
they f*cked us up. They told us we would have 1Ghz G4's, and days before
Macworld, the f*ckers told us there was a defect which would cause them
to fail above 900Mhz." Days later, the relationship becomes cordial
again when Motorola shows renewed interest when SGI and Cisco Systems
start looking into the G5.</strong><hr></blockquote>

[quote]Originally posted by ConvertedFromPC:
<strong>I've decided it's stupid to worry about hardware, because I can't affect anything anyway and all it does is make me wonder, so whatever happens, happens. But I did come across this from a friend and I think it's interesting to sort of think about it. I'm not looking for speculation, seems like everyone is interested in finding other opinions in hopes of reinforcing their own, it reminds me of people who listen to other people's political views instead of quietly forming thier own from personal experience and preferences. Anyway, if you get a minute check out this article.

I remember reading it a LONG time ago...and probably from The Register originally. I didn't put too much faith in it though. Truthfully, part of me still has a glimmer of hope for the "G5" (will Apple call it that?) but my sources have told me without hesitation that G4 Apollos are still under heavy development in Dual configurations over at Apple, with much higher speeds than the moment (see other threads for my semi-informed predictions), thus pointing directly at G4s for MWNY in the new PowerMac.

Do I expect a new chip at MWSF? I have no timetable information. No one I know has or has even seen a G5 prototype, but I know a few with G4 boxen (sealed of course, but thats what System Profiler is for ) that smoke. I anticipate that something is coming in 2003. What I don't know, and which Macworld is up for grabs. Here's my ideal situation:

Ah who knows. I mean what do all these people really gain by making up a three page post about the G5? We've read so many conflicting reports. I remember reading at least parts of this article. The only thing right about this post was that the LCD iMac cam out at SF. But the economy certainly screwed things up, assuming there is *any* truth to this article. It just seems like hopes and dreams scrawled on a newsgroup, but no real reason at all....